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Lawsuit: Controversy Could Delay Texas Execution

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The gurney in the death chamber is shown in this May 27, 2008 file photo from Huntsville, Texas.

Attorneys for a Texas death row inmate set to die next week have filed a federal civil rights lawsuit seeking to delay the punishment because of a bungled execution a week ago in Oklahoma.

Lawyers for condemned inmate Robert Campbell said Tuesday the refusal of Texas prison officials to identify the source of the state's supply of the execution drug pentobarbital raises the risk that Campbell's punishment could be "as horrific as" Oklahoma's attempt a week ago to execute prisoner Clayton Lockett.

Lockett's punishment went awry when an intravenous line of lethal drugs became dislodged. He later died of an apparent heart attack. Campbell's lawyers say it doesn't matter that Texas uses a different drug.

Campbell is scheduled to die May 13 for the 1991 rape and slaying of a Houston woman.